Sword of Fargoal, which was the runner-up for our 2009 Game of the Year (People’s Choice), is soon going to be updated for free to Sword of Fargoal 2. In this update, the game’s engine will be rewritten from the ground up, adding changes to combat, inventory management, UI, as well as adding a slew of new items and monsters. The developers will also have the ability to create dungeons, meaning they’ll be able to generate levels with set parameters, such as size and difficulty.

Sword of Fargoal 2 will also introduce in-app purchases for weapons, armor, and other items. These will be available to any new character you start. All in-app purchase items will be available for free by finding them in the game as well, but we couldn’t confirm if they’re awarded to every new character this way.

The update to Sword of Fargoal 2 will be free for all current users, while the game will cost $4.99 for newcomers. It will also go universal.

Meanwhile, Sword of Fargoal Legends will remain the classic Fargoal experience. While currently exclusive to the iPad, it will be updated to be universal simultaneously with the launch of Sword of Fargoal 2. A price drop is also being considered.

Jeff gave us an ETA of mid-to-late January for both updates. This isn’t set in stone, but it seems likely we’ll be crawling through new dungeons sooner than later. We’re excited to try out this enhanced version of an already excellent dungeon crawler. Check out our interview with Jeff on this week’s podcast for even more discussion of the Fargoal series.

Sword of Fargoal was originally released on the Commodore 64 in 1983 and was an early example of the simpler role-playing game subgenre known as ‘roguelikes”. Roguelikes eschewed the long, winding tales of traditional RPGs in favor of crushing difficulty and randomized dungeon layouts and enemy placement. By having the player constantly die and restart in order to reach their goal, roguelikes were able compensate for their shorter lengths and maintain the illusion of depth on early computers with limited memory. The genre lives on today through titles like Shiren the Wanderer and the Pokemon Mystery Dungeon series, but those have evolved somewhat along with the times. For better or for worse, Sword of Fargoal arrives on the App Store relatively untouched.

While the gameplay of the beloved original remains mostly unchanged here, the presentation in this version has seen some appreciated enhancements. The opening movie as well as the transitional movies that play when going between floors are nicely stylized animations with hints of 3D visual trickery. The in-game graphics also use 3D for the dungeon walls while portraying the characters and modeling the music after 16-bit fantasy RPGs, a step above the blocky sprites and beeping soundtrack of the original. However, the characters don’t really walk around the environment as much as they hop and slide from place to place like citizens of South Park. The same goes for the battles in which you and your enemy slam into one another until somebody dies.

Toasty!

Also, since dungeons are created on the fly, they end up looking somewhat barren and similar, with only certain color differences setting levels apart. You can pinch the screen to zoom out and view your surroundings, but there is perpetual, swirling ‘fog’ covering most of the area since it hasn’t actually been created yet. It makes the game’s twenty floors unpredictable but also claustrophobic.

After creating your male or female character and rolling some dice to determine your stats, Sword of Fargoal dumps you straight into the first level with no context. In true old-school fashion, the entire story is found in the manual under the section known as ‘Fargoal Lore’. Long story short, the point of the game is to retrieve the titular sword from deep within the dungeon and return it to the surface. It’s a good thing that the story isn’t too prominent in the game, as you would get sick of hearing it every time you have to restart the game.

Bad as I wanna be.

Roguelikes are like arcade style RPGs, as they’re about seeing how far you can get in a single session. Battles, items, and spells management are mostly handled automatically and to help make the leveling up process even faster, players can sacrifice gold for experience points at the temples littered throughout the dungeon. It needs to be fast, though, because once you die (and you will die) you are sent back to the very beginning with a level one character and no items. You can save mid-dungeon, but it does not offset the trial and error nature of the game.

Success requires luck and smart thinking, but it’s less about trying to reach the sword than about seeing how close you can get to the sword before being taken out by a hobgoblin or teleport trap. That’s where the fun comes from, since there’s not much interaction beyond moving around the dungeon and initiating battles. But because you end up seeing the early areas so often, progress seems incredibly slow if not non-existent.

Outside of the fully functional touch controls and noticeably improved graphics, Sword of Fargoal is otherwise a respectful remake of the original. Those with nostalgia for Jeff McCord’s C64 classic will probably enjoy it on iPhone too. The rest of us will appreciate the ways it differentiates itself from standard RPGs but be frustrated by the now dated design.

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Industrial Toys has released it’s follow-up to the great Midnight Star. In Renegade, a much more casual game, the focus is on short bursts of play and the never-ending constant upgrading of weapons and gear. This game brings the great controls for a mobile FPS that the previous version had, but focuses less on the story and more on the frantic gameplay.

Heroes of Loot 2 is an update to the original that brings even more to love of the original. This time around the player chooses two player types to take into the dungeon, switching between them in the game as needed.

Heroes of Loot 2 is 50% off right now for launch.

After their job, of keeping the dungeons in balance, was done, our heroes needed a new job. Roaming the lands they found a call for heroes, a castle in need, possible even a damsel in distress?

Pick two heroes to take into the adventure, controlling both heroes and using their special skills to navigate the dangerous castle hallways, rooms and floors. Switching between the two characters to solve quests, puzzles, and of course clear the dungeons of all evil.

Human Resources Corporation, from some of the same fine folks that brought us World of Goo is a puzzle games that makes some of the basics of programming into a fun little exercise.

The premise is that the player is a new recruit in a corporation that need to tell other in game characters how to move and act by giving a set of program commands to complete tasks. It’s a great introduction to the logic used in programming and a fun little game with great personality. Which is expected considering the team that created this.

Temple Run 2 has done it again. Expanded into a whole new world with the Blazing Sands expansion. Available now in the game.

Touch Arcade notes:

It’s called “Blazing Sands,” and as you can see from the above trailer, you’ll be running through canyons along side raging rapids and Egyptian-y looking statues while marauding vines are smacking you in the face… Which really isn’t much of a surprise as vines in video games seem to be jerks almost 100% of the time. Of course there’s new stuff to unlock too between new outfits and Blazing Sands artifacts. If you collect ’em all, you’ll even get a swanky new hat.

From Martin Magni, the developer of the great Odd Bot Out, Mekorama hit the App Store this week. This charming puzzle game has the player guide a robot through a series of very unique 3D puzzles. The puzzles have shades of Monument Valley without the Escher inspired vibe.

One of the features that really sets this game apart from others is the integrated level editor. This lets players create their own levels and share them via a simple QR code integrated image. Take a look at the new levels shared on Twitter with the #Mekorama hashtag. I’ve even created one to test the path finding skills of that little robot.

Mekorama is free in the App Store with a pay what you want price model.

There have been a lot of games that have aped the style of Monument Valley, but not that have really gotten the idea and complexity of the game. That is until Evo Explores. Evo Explores really understand the game and does a great job of adding puzzle types to the original that it unashamedly takes inspiration from. It’s so good that members of the Monument Valley team have remarked how impressed they are.

But beside that, the game can stand on its own as well. It’s a great suspension of belief type puzzler with new and interesting mechanics and is just plain fun. The story that goes along is a little weak, but then again that’s just a small part of the game. Well worth a download.

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